One Damn Thing After Another

 

Issue No. 522 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (July 9, 2022) urges you to read a “Master Class” in leadership by former Attorney General William Barr. And this reminder: click here to download free resources from the 20 management buckets (core competencies).   Senator Everett Dirksen’s counsel to his son-in-law, Senator Howard Baker, after Baker gave a “windy maiden speech” in 1967: “Perhaps you should occasionally allow yourself the luxury of an unexpressed thought.” Bill Barr on Malice or Stupidity! We’ve all written our fair share of job descriptions over the years, right? So take out a blank piece of paper (you still use paper, right?)—and list the Top-10 roles and responsibilities for POTUS 47 (President of the United States, 2024-2028).  Extra Credit: List the Top-20 responsibilities of the White House chief of staff. Spelling and neatness count. Term Paper: List the Top-100 responsibilities of the Attorney General and—in 50,000 words or less—explain how the nation’s top law enforcement officer (though appointed by a Republican or Democratic president) can effectively call those legal balls and strikes and still keep his job! Required Reading: Oh…before you pick up your pen, read the absolutely fascinating, hard-hitting, poignant, often concerning, yet very witty book by Bill Barr (I've retitled it), “The 2022 Master Class in Seriously Critical Issues as Seen Through a U.S. Department of Justice’s Top Decision-Maker.” William P. Barr, now 72, served as the 85th Attorney General for the last two years of President Trump’s term. He also was the 77th Attorney General under President George H.W. Bush (1991-1993) and here’s a hint on your job description assignment:  When Ed Levi, Dean of the University of Chicago Law School (and then president of the university), was asked to describe his stint as Attorney General under President Gerald Ford, he responded, “It’s just one damn thing after another.” Did I mention that your required reading is One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General, the New York Times instant bestseller by William P. Barr? It’s a robust 567 pages (plus notes). But honest—Barr’s honesty and insights were so memorable, I would have enjoyed another 500 pages. So…how does Barr view the President’s job description? When COVID hit, Barr noted that “…the President’s desire to honor our federal structure and accommodate the states’ sovereign role was both sensible and, ultimately, unavoidable.” He adds, “But this collaborative approach required a statesman capable of herding cats—one with boundless patience and diplomatic skills, especially in an election year when his adversaries were at their worst in scoring cheap shots against him.” DEMOCRATS will appreciate this book. Barr writes that the COVID crisis “…required a statesman with the ability to explain complex matters and regional variations to the public with precision and clarity. Trump was not that statesman. He was a disrupter—he liked to move forward by confusing and rattling his opponents. After March 2020, that was basically the opposite of what his job called for.” (What’s on your CEO’s job description?) REPUBLICANS will appreciate this book. After about 300 page-turning “inside the Beltway” stunning moments (the Prologue explodes like a James Bond movie) and Oval Office policy debates (but often monologues), Barr then invests 200 pages for “Master Class” treatments of the gnarly issues facing our nation and world. With a conservative philosophical bent (yet an honest and balanced narrative), he offers real world solutions for:    • Upholding Fairness, Even for Rascals    • Bringing Justice to Violent Predators    • Fighting the Drug Cartels    • Securing Religious Liberty    • Taking on Big Tech    • Cops, Race, and the Big Lie    • Protest and Mayhem For a first-time author (I think he was way too busy with “one damn thing after another” to write a book earlier in his career), Barr’s writing is colorful, often elegant, and yet with a tell-it-like-it-is candor. Yes, he voluntarily served as Trump’s second Attorney General, and stayed through thick-and-thin for 23 months, but frequently pushed back. Yikes! What a tough job! (Where is that in the job description?) WHY READ THIS BOOK—whatever your political leanings? You’ll appreciate how leaders lead through the minefield of politics, egos, and crises. (Imagine: you’re the “CEO” of a government department with more than 100,000 employees in 50 countries. Click here for the DOJ’s current organization chart!) #1. MENTORING UP. How do you coach your boss or CEO to dial it back a bit? Maybe fewer press conferences during COVID? Fewer “gabfests.” Fewer tweets. Barr quotes Senator Everett Dirksen’s counsel to his son-in-law, Senator Howard Baker, after Baker gave a “windy maiden speech” in 1967: “Perhaps you should occasionally allow yourself the luxury of an unexpressed thought.” (Resource: Read the classic HBR article, “Managing Your Boss.”) #2. TWO TYPES OF LEADERS. In the chapter, “Eating Grenades,” Barr colorfully details the constant never-ending challenges of leading the DOJ. (Impossible, actually.) He describes two kinds of cabinet secretaries, those “…who are run by their agency. They do little else but respond to their in-boxes and thus are almost entirely reactive, spending their time hopping to other people’s priorities and putting out fires.” The other type: “Then there are executives who run the agency. This requires, in addition to responding to events, clearly identifying a core set of priorities, taking direct charge of them, and applying the energy necessary to overcome institutional inertia and bring them to fruition.”  The grenade metaphor? When working with White House counsel Pat Cipollone, “We operated like a tag team, so that neither of us would provoke too much of the President’s ire at one time. We referred to this as choosing who would ‘eat the grenade.’” #3. MALICE OR STUPIDITY? Commenting on Jeffrey Epstein’s 2019 suicide while in the custody of the Bureau of Prisons, Barr said that he personally reviewed the relevant video footage. He writes, “The fact that so many failures occurred at one time understandably led people to suspect the worst. But thorough investigations have shown once again the wisdom of Hanlon’s razor: don’t ascribe malice when stupidity is a sufficient explanation.” (Resource: More wisdom from Wikipedia!) #4. RECRUITING GOOD PEOPLE. I’ve often wondered (usually ascribing malice) why cabinet secretaries and senior White House staff continued to serve Presidents whose policies and/or character they could no longer support. Barr quotes Bob Gates (who served both Bush 43 and Obama). “‘Look, somebody has got to do these jobs,’ he said, ‘and what is best for the country is that we get good people who know what the hell they are doing.’” (By the way—as you might expect from the Trump White House—there are the occasional “strong” words used in this “damn” book!)   #5. CHIEF OF STAFF/LION TAMER. Barr notes that Trump’s fourth chief of staff, Mark Meadows, would sometimes take the heat for helping Barr and Cipollone protect the DOJ from “the President’s frequent bad ideas or his impulsive mistakes.” So what’s the job description of the chief of staff? “Before the election, Mark’s job was like a high-wire act; after Trump’s defeat, he was like a lion tamer without a whip and chair.” (Resource: read Rumsfeld’s Rules and his description of the job as “javelin catcher!”)   #6. MEMORABLE METAPHORS. My opinion: outstanding leaders have a steady supply of metaphors and well-crafted labels for describing challenging and complex issues. Barr is a master at this. When arguing with the Treasury Department that ATF (not a revenue source) belonged in the DOJ, Barr told Treasury Secretary Nick Brady (during Bush 41’s term), “Things that go Clink belong to you; things that go Bang should belong to me.” (Hilarious!) Other memorable metaphors and wordcrafting:    • “Hissy Fit” (Really…someone emoted inappropriately in our government?)    • Space Cowboys (the Clint Eastwood movie about geriatric astronauts): a moniker the younger DOJ staff assigned to Barr and two of his senior team members!    • Bamboozled: “Yet the FTC, bamboozled by economic mumbo jumbo, approved the acquisition.” (See the “Taking on Big Tech” chapter—brilliantly written.)    • Alligators: “Getting [Trump] to accept good advice was like wrestling an alligator.” And when asked how he felt beginning his first term as the AG, Barr commented, “Like I’m about to run across a river on the backs of alligators.”     • Skunk Works: Barr assembled a "skunk works" of key players to create “a specific plan of action to step up the fight against the Mexican cartels.” (See more about skunk works in the book, In Search of Excellence.) There’s much, much more—including Barr’s appreciation for Trump’s important policy decisions during his term. But he also quotes Salena Zito’s article in the Atlantic describing how people responded when Trump made outrageous claims. She wrote, “the press takes him literally, but not seriously; his supporters take him seriously, but not literally.” This is Barr’s first book. I would definitely read another damn book by Barr! (Visit here to read his speeches.) To order from Amazon, click on title for One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General, by William P. Barr. Listen on Libro.fm (22 hours, 1 minute). YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS: 1) Bill Barr writes about the death penalty: “Opponents cannot dispute that the proportionate penalty for murder is death. But they argue that it is somehow inconsistent to take a life in the name of upholding the value of life. This is a sound-bite argument lacking intellectual coherence.” (He builds his case in the chapter, “Bringing Justice to Violent Predators.”) Who on our team is gutsy enough to push back on, perhaps, our simplistic “sound-bite arguments” that we’ve grown accustomed to using in defense of our mission? 2) Barr had a good working relationship with FBI Director Christopher Wray. (Yet Trump wanted to fire Wray for a variety of reasons Barr thought inappropriate.) “I thought [Wray's] low-key, businesslike style—he called himself a ‘workhorse, not a show horse’—was refreshing after Comey’s insufferable exhibitionism.” Discerning leaders know when to hire and when to fire (some say “hire slower, fire faster”). Are our job descriptions, SMART goals, and expectations clear in our organization—so there is clarity on character and performance standards?   Burned out or exhausted in this season of your leadership? Read one of these six books (below) on lessons learned by U.S. presidents and their chiefs of staff. (You’ll immediately feel better about your job!) POTUS Leadership Lessons Looking for several leadership books to read on the beach or in the mountains this summer? (Or if you’re a Southern Hemisphere reader, please jump in also!) [  ] The Presidents Club: Inside the World’s Most Exclusive Fraternity, by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy (Order from Amazon.) [  ] The Gatekeepers: How the White House Chiefs of Staff Define Every Presidency, by Chris Whipple (read John’s review) [  ] Rumsfeld’s Rules: Leadership Lessons in Business, Politics, War, and Life, by Donald Rumsfeld (read John’s review) [  ] Fight House: Rivalries in the White House from Truman to Trump, by Tevi Troy (read John’s review) [  ] How Ike Led: The Principles Behind Eisenhower's Biggest Decisions, by Susan Eisenhower (Order from Amazon.) [  ] Eisenhower 1956: The President’s Year of Crisis—Suez and the Brink of War, by David A. Nichols (read John’s review) For more leadership and management insights, read Mastering the Management Buckets Workbook: Management Tools, Templates and Tips from John Pearson, with commentary by Jason Pearson (2nd Edition, 2018) - Order from Amazon.                   JASON PEARSON: UNEXPECTED CREATIVE. Does your chief marketing officer feel like a “lion tamer without a whip and chair?” Is it just one crazy thing after another—with no coherence in your marketing and communication strategies? We can help! Contact Pearpod Media (Design, Digital, Marketing, Social). WORKBOOK AVAILABLE To order the 107-page workbook featured at John Pearson’s three-hour seminar with The Barnabas Group San Diego, visit Amazon for The 4 Big Mistakes to Avoid With Your Nonprofit Board: How Leaders Enrich Their Ministry Results Through God-Honoring Governance (Third Edition). Order here. MORE RESOURCES: • BLOG: Pails in Comparison • SUBSCRIBE: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews • JOHN'S BOOK REVIEWS: on Amazon  • WEBSITE:   Management Buckets • BLOG: Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations IMPORTANT NOTICE! Effective Oct. 1, 2025, all 657 eNews issues, previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to a new website here. New book reviews will also be archived at John Pearson’s Buckets Blog. Or, click here for John’s recent book reviews on Amazon.